by Ed Nelson
Tom and I walked to school together. We both agreed the roller skating was fun, but not as good as ice skating. We would check out the ice pond out this Friday evening. The pond was across from the tennis courts in Mary Rutan Park.
The city floods the field with a foot or so of water every fall to form a skating pond about an acre in size. There were lights so we could skate at night and a small shed which can hold a dozen people. It has benches to use while putting your skates on along with a fireplace if you get too cold.
It is attended by a city worker who keeps a roaring fire going. I suspect he is also there to prevent kids from using it as a make out place.
Mr. Brown the school janitor was mopping the water up from the snow we brought in with our shoes. He must dream of mopping. Tom Wilson who can be pretty stupid at times ran at the puddle and tried to slide across the floor.
He made it about two feet to a dry spot and landed hard on his butt. We all laughed at him when he stood up. He bowed to all.
Since this was the first dumb thing Tom had done since the food fight we figured he was due. Apparently Mr. Brown didn’t see it that way as he took Tom to the office. Well it got Mr. Brown out of mopping, so maybe he just took the opportunity at Tom’s expense. Some things are like day and night, they just happen.
I turned in my weekly paper to Mr. MacMillan my World History teacher. It was the first paper that I had typed out. It had the footnotes and citations. I can tell you it is really a pain to correct typing mistakes.
I had kept at it till I had a clean copy for my first effort. Mr. MacMillan held it up for the class to see then he passed it around.
“This is the sort of work you will have to learn to do if you intend to go to college. I urge those that can to take typing and move up to this level.”
I heard a muttered, “Way to go Jackson you just made it harder for us to get a good grade.”
I turned around and it was Tom Wilson. He didn’t seem to be the happy go lucky class clown at the moment.
I winked at him. That didn’t help matters but I wasn’t too worried. I was twice his size and he didn’t have a reputation as a fighter. After class he cornered me.
“How did you get to take typing already? I thought it was reserved for girls or senior boys who need an elective.”
“I bought a typewriter and have been teaching myself.”
“I may have to go that route or use the one at Dads office to practice on.”
“You sounded like you were unhappy about me turning in a paper like that.”
“Ah, I just have a reputation to maintain as a smart aleck. Actually I want good enough grades to be admitted to Ohio State as a business major. If I am going to run Dads print shop in the future I will have to know about business.”
I had known Tom Wilson for eight years and had never seen this side of him. I wonder who else I know that differ from the front they put on.
At lunch a bunch of the kids went outside and built snowmen on the front yard of the school. Others made snow angels and even more got into snowball fights, of course this lead to your standard bloody nose.
This time is was my old friend Tom Pew who had the honors. I stayed inside and did some research in the school library. A paper I was considering writing was on the Indians in Ohio.
I knew that the Indians were members of the Shawnee and that Chief Blue Jacket had a town near Bellefontaine and that Chief Blackhoof was over in Wapakoneta, but that was about it. It would be nice to know a little about them. I couldn’t find anything in the school library, so thought I would go downtown to the Carnegie public library after school.
The rest of the school day was school, in other words both teachers and pupils got through it. As usual I kept to business doing my class work ahead. I had kept track loosely of the time spent by teachers giving new information or concepts to students and repeating it till at least the average member of the class appeared to get it.
Maybe fifteen minutes of each day was new information, the other half hour of the class was repetition. Since I had already studied ahead it was only for that information which I didn’t understand or had further questions on that caught my attention.
I was actually getting about five minutes of teaching in each forty five minutes of class. The rest of the time I spent studying or writing ahead.
At first teachers would call me out for not paying direct attention in class. Very quickly they learned that I had a good command of the material and left me alone. If I would ask questions about the material from pure curiosity the teacher would give me a short answer.
If on the rare occasion it was something the teacher cared about it would divert the direction they were teaching. This was good and bad. It was not covering information that would be on tests, but at the same time the students would actually pay attention.
No matter what, we all got through the day. I trudged through the snow to the library. Some people cleared their sidewalks, some didn’t. It made for an interesting journey. It also left me with wet and cold feet. I was glad to get to the library.
My relationship with the library was not the normal one for a student. When I was a newspaper delivery boy the library was on my route. I would deliver the paper and immediately check to see if there were any new books.
I was a voracious reader from about the third grade on when I had discovered the library existed. That was a magical spring day. As a class outing one afternoon we walked the five blocks from Suzie Parker grade school to the library. That was the start of a long relationship.
I had checked out so many books over the years the head librarian, Virginia had given me the privilege of signing my own books in and out. My card number was 425e. I got very adept at pulling the book card out of its holder pasted in the back of the book, writing the due date and my number on the card and filing it under its due date in the book card tray.
If the library was really busy when I was there I would help check books in and out.
Because of this activity I had total freedom of the library. I had explored every nook and cranny. On this trip I went to the card catalog shelves and very quickly found there was little material to be checked out. There were some reference works, but they seemed to be overdone academic studies that would bore you out of your mind without giving the real flavor of events.
The books would tell you that in the French and Indian war Major General Edward Braddock Commander of the British forces in North America attacked Fort Duquesne in 1775 with fourteen hundred men and was repulsed with heavy losses.
The reality was that only five hundred men escaped and many of them were wounded. Braddock himself died four days after the battle. His troops buried him in the middle of the trail and drove their wagons over it to hide the grave so his body wouldn’t be desecrated.
The Chaplin was wounded, so the brief service was presided over by a young volunteer American officer, George Washington. As Braddock lay dying he gave his Coldstream Guards ceremonial sash to Washington who wore it with his uniform for the rest of his life.
They were harassed by the Indians for many miles. That retreat must have been hell. A young Indian by the name of Catahecasca was in the battle, later he became known as Chief Blackhoof. It was Blackhoof whom I was interested in learning more about.
Since I wasn’t finding anything helpful upstairs I went to the basement. The basement had the restrooms and a large meeting area. All walls were lined with bookshelves. These held the books which had not been checked out for at least ten years. The library never threw books away they just moved downstairs. These shelves held many treasures.
Chapter 26
It was here I found the book Falcons of France. It was by Nordoff and Hall who had served in the American volunteer group the Lafayette Escadrille. They went on to write the Mutiny on the Bounty. The flying book had pictures from the time period and really told the story of those airmen in the early days of World War I.
It also held a copy of Olaf Stapleton’s First
and Last Men the grandest look at mankind’s future ever written. It spread across two billon years and eleven distinct stages of man, we being the first. I read and reread that book. Before I found it, it hadn’t been checked out since 1937. The card in the back will show I checked it out three times from 1955 to 1958.
I was hoping to find something in this stack of forgotten works. I was surprised when I realized there was another person down there sitting at one of the work tables. I recognized Janet Rupert immediately. I used to deliver her newspaper. Mrs. Rupert had several books out and was taking notes.
She said, “Hello Ricky what brings you to the dungeon?”
I had never thought of it as a dungeon, a treasure vault was more like it.
“I would like to learn more about the Indians of this area especially Chiefs Blue Jacket and Blackhoof. “
“You came to the right place. Did you know I am working on a book that covers the Indians of Ohio?”
“It is about a young American settler by the name of Oliver Spencer. He was held captive by the Indians, finally set free and became a lifelong friend. He knew Blackhoof very well and helped the Quakers set up the Indian farms near Lewistown and what is now St. Johns. I have a working title of “Howling Wilderness, the Indian captivity of Ollie Spencer.”
“Is it going to be published?”
“I certainly hope so, but I’m just getting a good start.”
“Would you please guide me, I don’t even know where to look.”
“Why don’t you start with some original material?”
“What is that?” I enquired.
“Material which was generated in that day and age.”
“They would have that here in the library?”
“Let me show you.”
She then proceeded to show me something I had never noticed before. On top of one of the cabinets were large books. They were only a couple of inches thick with hard backs but they were huge.
As a matter of fact they were bound newspapers. In the 1930’s there was a project to preserve the old newspapers they had on hand. It had continued to this day. Each book had its dates embossed in gold. Some of those newspapers I had delivered.
The book she showed me was not the Bellefontaine Examiner but the Bellefontaine Gazette from 1832. I had just found many more hours of browsing.
She explained to me that they had to be handled very carefully. I should bring white cotton gloves in the future. They were trying to convert them to microfiche but hadn’t raised enough money yet. I asked how much they still needed.
It would cost five hundred dollars to convert everything pre 1900.
“How much for the entire collection,” I asked?
“It would be two thousand dollars up front and two hundred dollars a year every year thereafter. I am on the library board and we can’t figure out how to raise the funds. If we could get half of it the state would match the rest,” she told me.
“So you would need one thousand two hundred and fifty dollars to start and one hundred dollars a year after that.”
“That would do it, are you going to write a check,” she asked with a cheeky grin.
“Let me think about it, I may be able to help,” I replied.
I was so proud this decision could wait! I would think about it, talk it over with my parents and if we all agreed it was a good idea I would write that check.
‘Oaky we will be waiting.”
The way she said it she must have thought it was going to be a really long wait, like until something froze over.
When I started reading the Gazette one of the first stories was an obituary for Chief Blackhoof. He had died late the year before 1831 and this was dated January 1832 so it was a good lead story. It turns out there was debate about how long he lived. Some accounts had him one hundred and ten years old, but most others thought he was ninety when he died.
He was really entwined with early American expansion. He fought against the British in the French and Indian war. He decided that the Indian way of life could not stand against the Americans.
He negotiated with President Jefferson in Washington and allied with William Harrison, who would become a President of the United States, at the battle of Fallen Timbers against Chief Tecumseh. This victory ended the Indians chances in Ohio.
It was the same as every time a hunter gatherer society met a farming society. The farmers didn’t need as much territory. Another grim fact the farmers would out breed the hunters.
The hunters would starve to death in the winter. Birth rates would be low in a starving population. This is why there were so many whites kidnapped by Indians. They were trying to replace their population.
Blackhoof was smart enough to see how events would proceed, so he allied with the new American Nation. He met with then President Jefferson in 1802. Since Blackhoof was a Principle Chief of the Shawnee. Jefferson ordered that Blackhoof was to be presented with a large Peace Medal.
This would have been made out of silver and be four by six inch oval to be worn about the neck. The Gazette had an article that described the medal in great detail. For some reason it was of great interest to them at the time.
The medal was actually two silver sheets fitted together. They couldn’t stamp them out at the Philadelphia mint with equipment they had so they engraved two silver sheets with cardboard between them.
They then put a copper edge around the two sheets to hold them together. Thus the medal was light in weight. For the longest time Indians would complain about the light weight when compared with their earlier British counterparts. This continued on until better equipment was installed in Philadelphia.
These were the same medals that Lewis and Clark handed out on their expedition. They were very rare and valuable. The article explained that Chief Blackhoof’s medal had disappeared in history.
It was speculated that it was buried with him which was a practice of the Shawnee. Since the exact whereabouts of his grave wasn’t known there wasn’t a chance it could have been stolen. That is if it was buried with him.
The article continued on that other records state that he never received the medal. That it was presented to an Indian who went by the name of Captain Lewis. It is a fact the Lewis received a medal on that trip and used the event of its presentation to declare himself a Chief. He was a tall good looking man who always dressed well to present a good image, and was known as a self-promoter.
He had a group of Indians at what is now Lewistown. They followed him even after they found out he was taking money destined for the tribe from the Federal Government to buy land in his own name. He lost his rank with all the other members of the tribe. He went to Kansas when the Shawnee were relocated and died there in 1826.
At the same time Blackhoof led the Shawnee to Kansas but was allowed to return to Blackhoof Village to spend his last years. He died in 1831.
There was enough information available from the 1832 Bellefontaine Gazette for half a dozen papers. I thanked Mrs. Rupert for her help. She told me that it was no problem that if I was really interested in the Ohio frontier days that in the spring the Logan County Historical Society would be restoring Manary’s Blockhouse.
I asked her what a blockhouse was. She told me that it was like a log cabin that was fortified. It would be a place local settlers could retreat to in times of trouble and served as a trading post for the area.
The Manary Blockhouse had been moved from its original location north of Bellefontaine to Russells Point right across from and near the amusement park. It was privately owned but deteriorating so the Historical Society volunteered to restore it.
The present owner had bought it with the vague idea of using it as a paying tourist attraction but had never been able to make it work and would love to sell it. The Historical Society would love to have it but didn’t have the funding. I told her I would be interested so call me when the time came.
She said, “Okay how about this Saturday?”
“I thought you said in th
e spring.”
“I did, but I have to go up by myself on Saturday to survey what work needs to be done and report back to the Society. I really wasn’t looking forward to doing that myself.”
Since I didn’t have anything planned I told her yes.
“Be sure to wear old clothes and bring a flashlight, if you have a flash camera that would help.”
“What time and where do we meet?”
“If I picked you up would nine o’clock be okay?”
“That would be good. See you then.”
She left and I continued reading the Gazette from over a hundred years ago. An article in the next issue caught my eye.
The headline was, “Still no leads in Blackhoof robbery.”
It appears about a month before Blackhoof died there was a break in at his house on a Sunday morning while he was at church. It mentioned that papers and other items of value were missing.
No progress had been made since, “there being no Sheriff or Constable near Blackhoof Village. A Deputy Sheriff would visit from Piqua in the spring.”
That is a long response time, over six months. I wondered if the bad guys had time to get away.
I went home to the fun part of the day. The snow had melted enough that making a snow man was out and I was too late anyway. I arrived at the same time as Mrs. Hernandez. She was a very patient person and didn’t care what direction we took things as long as it was in Spanish.
Denny and Eddie had been insufferable little brats till we had started studying together. Now we had fun going back and forth. What was irritating in English was fun in Spanish.
Then there was the Mary effect. Who could get upset with that cute little girl? If we got snippy with each other she would stomp her foot and put on her best Mum voice and call us by our full names. I swear women are born with that ability.
After dinner I practiced my typing for a second session. I had now gone half way through the teaching text and my speed was up to almost thirty words a minute without errors or looking. Touch typing was neat but after my schooling was done I wondered if I would ever use it again.